The Knight King Who Returned with Gods : Chapter 68
Translators: Nyx and Ririi Rain
Episode 68: Perfect Calculations, Fateful Victory
It wasn't just hunters who traveled to the Pantheon Guild
to see the hammer.
"This is the Pantheon headquarters, they say."
"Oh my, really? The one that's famous for its rice
and new religion?"
"Yes. My cousin's cancer was cured by eating rice
here."
Having already built up a good image with its blessed
crops and YubTubes, Pantheon was becoming a religious temple for those in the
know.
There hadn't been any full-scale religious activities
yet, but this time was different.
The Hammer of Geobrick, which was recovered from the
Gate, was revealed to be a holy relic in its own right, possessing the power of
soil and abundance.
A powerful holy relic could be compared to a saint. This
was something that the soldiers under Leon's command noticed: they were getting
healthier, gaining more muscle, and generally feeling better since the hammer
arrived.
The catalyst for this happened when Team Leader Jim
Do-Han, who had left his mother with dementia in a nursing home, brought her in
for a while due to the remodeling of the nursing home.
When the soldier asked if he could bring his ailing
mother for a while, Leon graciously agreed, and Team Leader Jim gratefully
brought her to the Pantheon building for a while. And then──
"Oh, Do-Han!"
"Uh, Mom? Do you recognize me?!"
Her dementia was gone.
“Oh my son! You’ve had a hard time because of your mom,
haven't you?"
"Heu, heu.. heu, heu, heu...!"
Before the miracle of her mother coming back to her
senses after suffering from dementia for over 5 years, Team Leader Jim Do-han
bowed down in front of the holy relic.
Yappy was filming this story from beginning to end.
[A Demented Elderly Woman's Mind Cleared Up at The
Premises of The Pantheon]
-This is a really bad movie. (This comment has been
deleted)
-What kind of bullshit is this──(This comment has been
deleted)
-This might be real. My uncle, who was terminally ill
with cancer, is healing from eating the rice from Pantheon, which I got for
him. (3,565 likes)
-Well, check this out. This got over 5,000 likes before
anyone even commented.
-I saw the Pantheon building from a distance while
playing golf, and the Wi-Fi automatically connected, but it was over a
kilometer away, so how did it happen?
It was a story that was too hard to believe, but visitors
came in one after another. Seeing that there was a video, the story of the
blessed rice must have spread, and that it was worth believing.
At first, Yappy denied these visitors.
-NON. Only challengers and devotees of the Pantheon are
allowed to visit.
"Oh, no... We've come all the way here, you have to
let us in once.......
-This is an invasion of private land. Advised to leave.
The machine blocked them without a single gap. And then,
Han Hari appeared as if she had been waiting.
"Sir Yappy."
-Kkilug?
“Could it be that these people actually came to pay their
respects at the Pantheon building?”
“Yes? No, what….”
"Wait, be quiet."
The visitor quieted down at his companion's urging. Hari
clapped her hands and said,
"There are many deities in the Temple of the
Pantheon. Why don't you get to know them, give a small offering, say a
prayer... and see the relic?"
-That makes sense.
Yappy nodded in agreement and moved its camera eyes over.
The visitors suddenly realized.
"Yes, of course! I was thinking of making an
offering!"
"Let's see, uh, here, I think this will do."
One visitor handed over a blue bill. Yappy looked at it
and threw it away.
-Lack of faith.
"......."
Visitors could only enter after depositing hundreds of
thousands of won.
"Is this legit? What kind of religion is it, forcing
people to worship and not accepting offerings under 500,000 won?"
"This is a cult──"
-Chwaag!
A creepy wire brushed the hem of the visitors' clothes.
-Do not say bad word. I know everything about Korean.
".....'Kay."
In front of the makeshift altar at Pantheon, the visitors
met a villager who was working as a laborer.
"Oh, hello. Are you here to worship at the
altar?"
"Uh, um... yes?"
“New believers are always welcome. Would you like to take
a look at the guide to the deities of the Pantheon that my village made?"
"You have such a thing?"
"Of course."
What the villager presented first was the code and
teachings of Demera, the goddess of life and fertility.
The Creed of Life and Fertility.
1. Create a figure of the goddess from the first harvest
and offer it on the altar.
2. Do not urinate on the fields. Manure is fine.
3. Make scarecrows and make sure to dress them with hats
and clothes.
4. Sing songs when you harvest. A song that expresses
gratitude to the goddess is even better.
5. Don't go hungry, even if you're busy.
............
............
The most important, number 0.
The reaver dies.
"Nice words."
"What is that about the reaver dies......."
The wording was a bit unfamiliar, but since it was a
religious creed, it had mostly good words.
After visiting the altar, singing praises to His Majesty
Leon Dragonia Lionheart, yelling for the demons to die, and purchasing temple
souvenirs (made in Yappy), visitors were finally allowed to enter the training
area where the holy relic was located.
"What the, why is the holy relic housed in such a
run-down place......."
The moment they entered the training ground, they saw it.
A huge one-handed hammer standing tall in the middle of a
desolate training ground.
Energy radiated from that sacred object. It was like
having your mind sharpened and your whole body refined.
"Huh? Huh?!"
"Why, what's wrong?"
"Oh, no... I, my eyes..."
"Your eyes?"
It was a young man wearing glasses. His eyes were so bad
that he had been judged to be severe myopia in renal examination.
But now, his vision became strangely blurry, and when he
took off his glasses, a world he had never seen before unfolded.
A modern man, who wore glasses more and more due to
smartphones, perceived the world with his bare eyes. The young man burst into
tears.
"Ah... Thank you, Goddess..."
-Bam!
"Praise for Ariana, for your kindness and for
healing my eyes!!!"
Here's another young man who became a follower of the
Pantheon.
-There is a donation envelope for the expansion of altar
facilities. Prove your faith.
"Oh, oh, sure. What I have right now is 200,000 won…
Is that okay?”
He had just recovered from a state-recognized eye
disability. He'd give his liver at this point.
-No problem. Faith is not measured by the size of the
offering.
"Thank you, Sir Yappy... the Holy Grail
Knight......."
The young man prostrated himself before Yappy and
worshipped, not remembering that he had been threatened before.
Like that──
Patients from all over came to visit with the mindset
that they had to prostrate themselves. After experiencing miracles with the
holy relic and blessed crop combo, they became followers.
As such people gathered and flocked together, the
Pantheon building became a hot spot for visitors, even foreigners, in Naju, a
city where tourist attractions were few and far between.
“Sir Yappy! Starbucks has requested a store!"
-I would like to see the amount of donations.
"Sir Yappy the Cherry Company, a developer of
training facilities for hunters, is willing to build a training facility in
exchange for advertising! It's time to modernize our Pantheon!"
-Wanting to know the amount of the offering.
"My God! The Governor wants to deliver a plaque of
appreciation, and he also wants to consult about the blessed crops!”
-Tell them that I will meet with them if they promise to
provide budget support.
Yakt Spinner was an AI killing machine in a cyberpunk
world and the Holy Grail Knight of Heto, the God of Metals and Blacksmithing.
Using the grand premise of securing funds and expanding
fame, it had been tenacious in its pursuit of money and resources.
And what did it do with that?
"Wow... Sir Yappy, what is this?"
-Heavy-duty forging facility.
In front of Hari was a massive metalworking facility at
the corner of the Pantheon building. Its futuristic design looked more like
something from the near future rather than modern.
"Sir Yappy... is this really a forge?"
-The lowest-level forge in my database. Earth's crude
metallurgy level can only do so much.
"Hmm... It looks pretty impressive, though."
-That's because you have the brain of an animal.
"That's too much!"
Hari pouted, but she was still secretly excited to see a
forge of such a high level in front of her eyes.
“Um, Sir Yappy. Sir Yappy is the Holy Grail Knight of the
God of Metals and Blacksmithing, right?”
-Yes.
"Well, can you make me a sword here as well?"
-No.
“Hehe… I guess so.”
Hari is, strictly speaking, an outsider. As a member of
the Association, she should be grateful to be given knightly training from the
Pantheon.
But that was not the reason for Yappy's refusal.
-The forging facility is not complete. Additional
facilities are needed to refine adamantite.
"I- is that so?"
-We need more money for that.
Yappy said that and went inside the forging facility.
The place was about the size of a two-story building, and
the entrance was barely big enough for Yappy to fit through, so there was no
way to tell what was going on inside.
-Minimum forging protocol initiated. Funding has been
secured.
Understanding the international situation.
Yappy accessed the global stock exchange through the
self-developed shared wireless Internet Wi-Fi-100Gbps installed at the Pantheon
building.
Recently, the global stock market was facing a
catastrophe.
Suddenly, there was a manipulative stock manipulator who
would jump in on soaring stocks, mess up the timing of their sales, and walk
away with the profits.
The so-called justifiable stock thief.
Needless to say, this stock market tycoon is Yappy, who
is often referred to as a ghost or a gang because of its elusive nature.
Yappy hacked into the world's networks to manipulate
stock prices, ruthlessly trampling over any dummy news or corrupt politicians,
media, or businessmen who intervened, manipulating information in its favor.
By messing up their selling and buying timings, and then
taking advantage of the gap to unload the manipulated stocks and get the hell
out of there.
-Holy shit, why the fuck are we being flooded with
contrarian articles at this time of year!
-You bastard, can’t you do it right? I paid you so much
money, but you can't manipulate a single piece of news!
-What? Now, wait! A power outage at this time? No! Cell
phone too? What kind of nonsense is this, that even satellite communication is
not working?
The financial world took notice of this phenomenon that
happened all over the world. This was because the pattern was very similar.
The methods may be different, but the same thing
happened: the price manipulators suffer terrible damage, and somebody who timed
a sell-off walked away with a nice profit.
Was this even possible?
In the first place, why would a force that can hack the
entire world's computer networks and render communication satellites inoperable
bother with stock price manipulation in the first place?
Having collected enough data and gained enough
experience, Yappy is now looking to move on toward greater profits.
The financial item that Yappy has its eye on is food.
The food situation of mankind in the 21st century had
never been good.
For one thing, too much of the world had been
contaminated by maso. In the early days of the cataclysm, the Western world and
East Asia reacted exemplarily.
They closed the gates, encouraged hunters to form large
guilds, and built a system that could handle even a Red Gate, except for
something like a Black Gate.
The downside was that they were beholden to the large
guilds, but as far as security goes, they were exemplary.
But for poor Eastern European countries, rigid Middle
East and Asian countries, as well as underdeveloped countries that can't afford
to train Hunters, the dungeon brake was a bust.
What's the problem when dungeon breaks occur? Well,
there's the human casualties from monsters.
But that is ultimately a secondary issue. The problem is
that the environment is contaminated with maso.
As seen in the cases of the Hunan and Naju plains, the
contamination of the land with maso is such a big problem that it threatens the
right to survival. Naturally, the value of the land drops to zero.
Yappy bought these contaminated lands. The first target
was the Beidahuang granary in the 'Heilong People's Republic' in northern East
Asia.
As one of the 50 autonomous Chinese states that carved up
after the Shanghai Incident more than 20 years ago, maso pollution here is
severe.
Yappy purchased part of this granary area, where nearly
half of the land was contaminated, and began purification work by spreading the
faith of Demera, the goddess of life and fertility.
Although large-scale cleansing and immediate crops
production at the level of Leon were not possible, the contaminated land had been
significantly rehabilitated through prayers and growing faith.
Now, once the crops are harvested, the land will be
transformed into a granary worth a fortune for its 'blessed paddy, corn, and
grains'.
The estimated revenue is in the tens of millions of
dollars. Add in the amount of taxes the farmers will pay, and it's even closer
to the goal.
-Calculating grain market impact. Margin of error
finalized.
This was just the beginning. Starting with that country,
the global food market will fluctuate greatly, and people will take it for
granted that blessed crops will one day appear on their dinner tables.
Of course, the only people who can grow those blessed
crops are farmers who worship Demera, the goddess of life and fertility, so in
effect, world food hegemony is ruled by the Pantheon.
The only concern about this grand plan is the region's
immediate neighbors....
Considering the complex situation of the '53 countries'
in East Asia, the machine believed that the possibility of an invasion of the
Beidahuang region was low.
After the cataclysm, world history had changed
drastically. Wars between nations have become a pointless waste of national
power, and more than anything, many of these countries are having a hard time
even dealing with their own gates.
In the end, it doesn't matter. No matter how much you
think about it, it doesn't matter. There was a time when some people clamored
for a united China, but that is now a thing of the past.
Many of those who broke away from the central government
and established their own rule did not feel the need to expand their territory.
Heilong's neighboring country, the Jilin Republic, is
also in a desperate attempt to close the gates.
A human leader with common sense would have no reason to
use excessive force here.
Logical calculation by big data followed by fateful
victory. That was the final judgment of Yappy.
A zero-sum game? High risk, high return? That's a
meaningless game of numbers in the face of AI.
The land will rise. It must rise. It's bound to rise.
Three days later.
[Coup d'état in Jilin Republic.]
-B, Boss Yappy! This is Manager Hwang! Food stocks! Food
stocks are plummeting! Word is out that an army of orcs is heading for the
granaries!
-Kkilug?
[A coup by orc forces, declaring an open invasion of the
granaries of the Heilong People's Republic to secure food.]
-The news is that the company's profits are about to
plummet! The losses have already exceeded 300 billion won! At this rate, it'll
collapse!
-Kkilug?
[United Nations criticism letter launched. Shock
statement by Lin Xiang Kazak, who staged the uprising, "Orcs decide
everything by war".]
[Detroit City Mayor is frowned upon for his public stance
in favor of the action.]
[Orc Discrimination Violates Political Correctness; Those
in Power Should Reflect and Understand Them]
[Chaos In The World Food Market. Will Beidahuang Granary
Fall Into Orc Hands?]
[Hyesung's rising private equity funds were impacted by
the sudden conflict, causing quarterly returns to plummet!]
-I'm from the bank. This is a foreclosure warning. You
have to repay 14 billion won in interest this month.
-Kki, kkilug?
What, did they just kick the door in?
***
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